


keep close these fragile bonds (and watch them crumble in thy hands)

by marathon (orphan_account)



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-28
Updated: 2013-05-28
Packaged: 2017-12-13 06:14:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/820970
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/marathon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Diverging paths converge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	keep close these fragile bonds (and watch them crumble in thy hands)

**Author's Note:**

> Written during season two, I am pretty sure. Rather outdated now, probably, I haven't watched Supernatural since season three.

It's in the secrets they keep from each other. It's in the way Uncle Nick ( _not really their uncle, just a man that Dad helped once, just the man that takes care of them and raises them in the long months that John Winchester disappears and comes back, run ragged and exhausted, stays a few days, maybe a week, maybe more sometimes, if Dean is lucky; but he always,_ always _leaves again_ ) lies to them about the way their house burned down and took Mommy with them; it's a lie because Dean remembers, remembers the fire and Mommy on the ceiling behind Daddy and the panic in his father's voice, remembers _"Take your brother outside as fast as you can; don't look back! Now, Dean, go!"_ ( _Not_ ) Uncle Nick never tells them anything about what Daddy does, but even at four years, Dean Winchester knows that his Daddy's a hero.

It's in how John leaves for days that turns into weeks that turn into months, but always manages to remember a card and maybe a present on his son's birthdays. It's in how Christmas is a non-issue because on Christmas Eve, Uncle Nick sets out an extra fourth setting at the dinner table and year after year, John is the one who finishes off all the mashed potatoes. It's the only dish Dean can make that actually tastes good, and every year he labors for hours in the kitchen in preparation.

It's in the way John turns up on their doorstep on Dean's sixteenth birthday, holding his internal organs in with his hands and Dean figures that everyone's forgotten in all of the hulabaloo, but John slits open one eye while Dean's sitting next to the bed and groans/slurs something that sounds distinctly like, "Happy birthday, son."

It's in the way Dean discovers a journal in his Dad's Impala while he's cleaning the upholstery ( _a beautiful car deserves to be treated like a princess,_ he tells Sammy and Sammy laughs at him, calls him a freak, and helps him wash the blood out) wedged carefully between the crevice between the bottom and top cushions, like someone tried to hide it quickly somewhere they hoped no one would find it.

It's in the way the first thing he does after he reads it is hide it in a place that Sammy won't find it.

It's in the way John's eyes flicker first with surprise, then horror, then resignation when Dean hands the journal back to him wordlessly the day John deems himself fit to leave again.

It's in the way Sammy stands a little closer to his big brother as they wave their father off again, and thanks God that Dean didn't leave with him, then wishes, a little selfishly, their father hadn't come home this time with a book filled with terrifying, supernatural truths that explain everything that Sammy's always wondered about.

This is the way the Winchesters protect each other.

This is the way the Winchesters drift apart, the air between them too thick with the things they won't say for them to say anything at all.

Sammy ( _no matter how much he protests, Dean refuses to call him anything else_ ) is in his sophomore year of high school when a man ( _Pastor Jim_ , he calls himself) drives up in the Impala with a urn full of ashes and a journal that they'd nearly forgotten. He, Uncle Nick, and Dean converse quietly and the pastor gives Dean the keys and the journal and Dean just stares at them a little bit while Sammy struggles to hear things like, "Colt" and "yellow-eyed demon" and "loved you boys" through the thick wooden door.

Dean drives the man home, the purr of the Impala's engine unfamiliar but comforting under his hands, and when he comes back, he doesn't talk to Sam or Nick for a week.

Two years later, Sammy calls Nick after he's all moved into his dorm in Stanford. "Is Dean there?" he asks.

Somehow, he's not surprised when the answer is, _'No, after you left, he took off. He's left a cell number though. You okay, Sammy?'_

He's silent for a moment. "Sam," he says, suddenly.

_'What?'_

"Call me Sam," Samuel Winchester says.


End file.
